Under Siege (42 page)

In the Post newsroom Ott Mergenthaler noticed the collective corporate decision to polish Quayle’s image and began making phone calls, trying to pin down producers and executives on why they made this decision. Over in the Joint Staff spaces of the Pentagon, Toad Tarkington noticed it too. And when Toad noticed something, he quickly made everyone in earshot aware of it. Today, as usual in his new assignment, his listeners were all senior to him in years, rank, and experience, but that didn’t seem to crimp the Toad-man’s style in any significant way.

“Hoo boy, I’m telling you, they’re grooming Danny the Dweeb for the big one. They ought to turn on the TV in George’s room. If he saw this he’d leap out of bed and jog down to the White House.”

“Mr. Tarkington,” the Air Force colonel said in a tired, resigned voice, “please! Must you?”

“This is all a sick joke, right? Quivering Dan Quayle? The pride of the Indiana National Guard? Somebody call me

the commercial comes on. I’m gonna go buy some

“Can it, Toad,” Jake Grafton said. “Don’t you have anything to do?”

“Yessir. As you know, I’m preparing a contingency plan to convert all the A-6’s to Agent Orange spray aircraft so we can zap the South American cocaine fields. I figure if we mix the stuff with the gas, we can just fly over the fields with the fuel dumps on and-was

“Back to work.”

“Aye aye, sir.”

Judge Snyder was at least seventy, with thin hair and a thick waist and big, hamlike hands. He was tall, about three inches over six feet, but he appeared taller because he moved with that clumsy awkwardness that some big men have. Still, the word that came to most people’s minds after they had met Judge Snyder was “crusty.” Even his wife used that word when describing him to new acquaintances. The young lawyers with fashionably long, styled hair who practiced in front of him would have added another word”…profane”-although no one had ever heard him indulge in salty language in the presence of his wife. Clearly he was not of the generation of the buttoned-down, big-firm Mercedes drivers who constituted the majority of the lawyers who practiced in his courtroom.

When Thanos Liarakos entered the judge’s office at ten o’clock on Monday morning, Snyder had a television going and was reading a newspaper. He held the paper up before him, spread wide, as he leaned back in his heavy swivel chair. His office was full of books, with briefs and case files stacked everywhere. On the wall behind him was a framed piece of needlework. Inside delicate pink and yellow flower borders were the words suEvery nm But at .

When the door closed Judge Snyder lowered one corner of the paper and frowned at his visitor. “Why aren’t you at home, Liarakos, watching the damned TV with everybody else?”

“Seen enough of it, Your honor,” was the reply. ,Me too. “nm that damn thing over there off, will you?”

Liarakos did, then dropped into a chair. He took an envelope from his jacket pocket and extracted the contents, which he handed to the judge.

Snyder reluctantly folded the newspaper and laid it in front of him on his desk. He perused Liarakos” document. “The prosecutor seen this?” the judge asked curtly. “Yes, sir.”

“What’d he sayt’ —Well, he didn’t want a say. Said he would abide by your

decision.”

“I know he’ll abide by my decision. I want to know if he wants to argue before I make it.”

“No. He doesn’t.”

“Well?” the judge said, holding the sheets between thumb and forefinger and waving them gently back and forth.

“It’s a personal problem. I just don’t think I can adequately represent Aidana and I want to be excused. There are dozens of competent, experienced criminal lawyers in this town and Aidana can afford any of them. Hell, he could hire lem all.”

“It’s personal.”

“Had some young puppy in here last week with a motion like this. It all came down to the fact he thought his client was guilty. This isn’t any damned silly nonsense like that, is

“No. It’s personal.”

“You sick?”

“No.”

“In trouble with the law?”

“No, sir.”

—Motion denied.” Snyder tossed the paper back across the desk. it ianded in front of Liarakos, who stared at it. “It’s my wife. She’s a cocaine addict.” “Sorry to hear that. But what’s that got to do with this mtion?” Liarakos raised his hands, then lowered them. He opened

his mouth, then closed it and stared at his hands. “I want out. I can’t in good conscience defend Aldana. He’s entitled to a good defense and I can’t give it to him. “Horseshit,” Judge Snyder said. “How many lawyers are there these days who haven’t had a friend become addicted to something? All these damn fools used pot in college. They go to parties and somebody has a sugar bowl full of powder for the guests who are ‘with it I may be an old fart but I know what the hell goes on. Half the bar has your problem or some version of it.”

Seeing the look on Liarakos” face, Judge Snyder’s tone softened, “Now look. If I approve that motion, Aldana’s new lawyer will think up fifty reasons why he needs a ton of extra time to study the government’s case and file motions and I’ll almost have to give it to him. Yet the government wants Aldana tried as soon as possible, for a lot of reasons that have to do with foreign policy and our relations with Colombia. Those reasons are good ones, in my opinion. I suggest you talk to your client. Tell him what you’ve told me. If he wants to get another lawyer, that’s his business. It’s his ass. But the new lawyer will get not one more day than you’ve got. Tell Aldana that too.”

“I’ve already talked to him,” Liarakos said. “He wants me. “Did you tell him your wife was a cocaine addict?”

“Yes. I did.”

The judge very much wanted to ask what Aidana’s reaction to that revelation was, but he refrained. Attorneyclient privilege. He contented himself with readjusting his fanny in his chair and easing the pressure on his scrotum. He also raised an eyebrow.

“He just grinned,” Liarakos muttered. He stood up and walked around the room.

He was examining a law book when he said, “I probably shouldn’t say this, but I will. My impression is that it really doesn’t matter to Chano Aldana who his lawyer is. Apparently the man thinks he’ll never go to trial.”

“Had a dog like that once,” Judge Snyder said, and lazily stretched his arms out as far as they would go. “Kept

shitting on the carpet. His education was painful, but he finally got the message.”

At two o’clock that afternoon VicePresident Quayle held a news conference. Television rating services later reported that more people watched this news conference than any previous one in the history of television. When Quayle first walked into the glare of the television lights and looked at the sea of faces of the waiting media, he handled it well, his aides offstage thought as they watched him on a monitor. He looked calm, properly somber, in charge. He began by reading a short statement that expressed the nation’s outrage at the person or persons who had attempted to take the President’s life and the government s resolve to bring the perpetrators to justice. The aides nodded with every phrase. The VicePresident had rehearsed this little speech for a quarter hour, and it came off just right, they thought.

The first question was unexpected, however, and horrified the aides and William C. Dorfman, who stood among them staring at the monitor with his tummy hanging over his belt and a sheen of perspiration on his forehead. “Mr. VicePresident, a group calling themselves the Extraditables, who are known Colombian narcotics traffickers, has just claimed credit for shooting down President Bush. Does the government have any evidence to support or refute that claim?”

It was here that the worldwide audience got another look at that blank, frozen, wide-eyed stare that an inspired reporter had once dubbed “the deer in the headlights look.”

“I… I hadn’t heard that,” Quayle said after a few seconds. “Did it just come in?”

“Yessir. From Medellin, Colombia.”

“Well, I don’t know,” Quayle said lamely. “We are investipting-looking at evidence and all-I don’t know. Ahh … of course, nut groups and criminals can say anything. We’ll see.”

The same reporter had a follow-up question. “What will the United States government’s response if the ,eaPxtraditables’ claim proves to be true?”

“Well, I don’t know that it is true. As I said, criminals can anything. If it’s true, I don’t know. We’ll … ahh …” don’t want to … ahh … speculate about what we might do.”

Offstage Dorfman nodded vigorously. He had Impressed on the VicePresident the necessity of not committing himself or the government to any particular course of action on any matter. So far so good.

“Why,” another reporter asked, “haven’t the people who did this been apprehended?”

Quayle was ready for this one. “The various lawenforcement agencies are doing everything within their power to find the people who shot down the President. I am satisfied with the manpower and methods they are using. We will announce results when we have some that can be publicized without jeopardizing the ongoing investigation.”

“Do you feel,” a woman reporter asked, “that you are capable of properly fulfilling the heavy responsibilities that you have just assumed?”

“Well … I … I think I can do what needs to be done. I’m hoping right along with everybody else that George Bush recovers quickly and can reassume the responsibilities of his office.” Here the VicePresident spoke sincerely, and quite effectively, Dorfman thought. This response had been carefully rehearsed. “No one wants George Bush to get well more than I do. I’m praying for him and I hope everyone else in America is too.”

When it was over Dorfman led the entourage back toward the office spaces as he snarled at his executive assistant, “Get me a copy of that damned Extraditables press release. And get the CIA and State Department people over here on the double. I want to know what the fuck is going on and why the bell the press got it before we did. I want to know now!”

Also the conference in the cabinet room that followed, Quayle sat at the center of the table where Bush normally sat and said little. Arranged around the table were the directors Of the FBI, CIA, and DEA, the assistant secretary of

state-the secretary had died in the helicopter crash that had injured the President-the attorney general, and the head of the Secret Service. Dorfman sat beside Quayle and did the talking. As usual, he was blunt. “Are the Extraditables behind this?” No one knew. “By God, we’d better find out and damn fast.”

“We’re squeezing our sources now. We’ll hear something soon.”

“Squeeze harder. We’ve got to find out who is behind this attempted murder and get these people arrested. Right now the public is holding its breath. We can’t get on with the business of government when ninety percent of the stuff in the newspapers and on the air is about assassins and victims. So the people who did this have got to be found. Find them.”

Afterward Dorfman had a private conference with Dan Quayle, a man whom he would have despised if he had ever taken the time to think about him, which he hadn’t. Dorfman occupied the center of the universe and everyone else merely orbited his star. Still, whi he had never had any patience with people who lacked his intellectual gifts, lazy rich people who effortlessly along enjoying life’s bounties had always brought forth the darkest side of his aggressive personality. Just now he had to steel himself to treat Quayle with what he thought was deference.

“This Extraditables claim,” he muttered, “is political dynamite. No doubt this very minute someone is advocating tilde an invasion of Colombia. The least misstep and we could have Colombians publicly assaulted in our streets. Remember the hostage mess in Iran ten or eleven years ago?”

Quayle remembered.

“And yet, if we don’t take measured, positive steps to handle this mess, people will say that you’re incompetent. Anything you do will be too much for some people, too little for others.”

“I’ve been in politics for a while,” Quayle said, a little

noyed at Dorfman. He disliked being patronized and that all he ever got from Dorfman. He had spent the last two assiduously avoiding the man.

Dorfman continued, trying to sound reasonable. “My role for the President has been to play the bad cop, the hard ass, the guy who says no. I suggest that until the President recovers enough to resume his duties, you continue to use me the same way. Let me play the heavy. When something positive comes along, you take the credit.”

“That might have worked for George Bush, but it won’t work for me,” Dan Quayle said. “Nort over the long haul. People think I’m incompetent, a featherweight.” Dorfman tried to interrupt but Quayle kept going. “I’m not going to let you be de facto President while I sit on my thumb. That won’t work.”

“I know that, sir. I’m merely making a suggestion. You’re the man in charge.”

Quayle’s innocent blue eyes zeroed in and didn’t blink. “Governor, I’m going to lay it right on the line with you. Everyone knows that you wanted to be the vice-presidential candidate in ‘88 but Bush picked me instead. Everyone knows that you want the spot in ‘92. And everyone, including tilde me, suspects that you’ve been lobbying the President to dump me from the ticket.”

“I haven’t,” Dorfman said, his face reddening.

Dan Quayle continued as if he hadn’t heard. “Right now I don’t think it would be a good idea to replace Bush’s team, at least until we get some idea of when the President might be capable of resuming his duties. But,” Quayle added matter-of-factly, “this team had better get some results.”

At four p.m. that afternoon Thanos Liarakos had a short visit with his client, Chano Aldana, in a cell. The guard was outside and the two were alone. Liarakos had long suspected these visitation cells were hugged but this afternoon he never gave possible listeners a thought.

“Your colleagues in Colombia are taking credit for the attempted assassination of George Bush.”

Aidana merely grunted. Something like amusement played across his fleshy features. “Well, did they do it? Or did you hire it done?” “What’s it to you, Mr. American lawyer?”

“I’m your defense counsel. I want to know if you’re responsible for the attempt on the President’s life.”